This Mask I'm Wearing
by ImpossiblyWeird
Summary: She's been Jupiter for a while now. Too bad she has to throw that identity away to survive.


She's standing in Stark Mountain facing a 10 year old girl in battle. If it was any other girl, this would be easy, and her pathetic Pokémon would be lying on the ground, trampled by Jupiter's. But it isn't any other girl—it's Dawn. Dawn the current champion of Sinnoh after she defeated Cynthia, Dawn the first one to complete the Sinnoh Pokédex, Dawn the one who has captured all of Sinnoh's legendary Pokémon. Dawn the one who is bent on destroying Team Galactic along with all of Jupiter's hopes and dreams.

She's helplessly watching her Skuntank fall to the rocky floor of the cavern as the brat's Empoleon unleashes a tidal wave, and she returns her final Pokémon back into the Pokéball. The battle is over and the outcome is the same as every single battle she's had against that child before. Dawn's face is flushed, and Jupiter sees her hugging her Empoleon for single-handedly destroying her team before returning him. Jupiter doesn't understand how Pokémon can be more than tools, more than something people use to achieve things, because that's what everyone does, no matter how they phrase it. And to Jupiter, phasing doesn't mean anything.

Mars is angrily sputtering now, and Jupiter can tell all of those losses to a child are starting to weigh down on her shoulders, pride shattered long ago. "We're going back to being ordinary girls." Mars is done with Team Galactic, done with the world without Master Cyrus, the one light they had. "You can mop up whichever way you want." She slams her hands onto her hips, and waits for Jupiter to follow her lead.

Jupiter sighs as she comes to the scary realization that there is no longer anything left for her here in Team Galactic. She doesn't know why, but Jupiter tells Dawn in an eerily calm voice that she's following Mars and quitting Team Galactic. Charon, forgotten by all those who actually did something useful and productive, just stands there, gaping in shock that there are now two less commanders in their team. She passes the mantle of Team Galactic to him, the commander who was always there just for show. "What should I do now?" Jupiter mused, laughing to herself about the future that could have been, the road she didn't take. "Is leaving on a journey the right idea?"

Dawn just stands there silently, frowning at the two fallen commanders. Her stare begins to unnerve Jupiter as she realized she's actually contemplating what Jupiter just said. Mars spins on her heels and marches out of Stark Mountain, and Jupiter follows her, unsure of where she's going.

.

It's been two months, and Jupiter is lost. Mars left to find Master Cyrus with Saturn weeks ago, and she hasn't heard from them sense. She's been to the Distortion World, even if it was just a moment. She had gone with her fellow ex-commanders to Sendoff Spring, and had navigated Turnback Cave and hopped through the portal. Jupiter didn't have the resolve to keep going, she had lost it along with that final battle, and had left Mars and Saturn when they had eagerly ran off to look for Master Cyrus.

After escaping from the Distortion World, Jupiter had taken to aimlessly drifting around Sinnoh. She had stolen a tent and other survival supplies in Veilstone City and stole food whenever she had the chance to. Nothing was worth spending money on, and she could feel her mind slowly wasting away. Jupiter is steadily dying inside, and she doesn't know what to do anymore.

Right now, she's stuck in Eterna Forest setting up camp as far away from other trainers as she can. She managed to find some berries on the road, and was thankful for the food. Jupiter isn't stupid enough to go steal anything right now—the entire region is searching for her. Charon had been imprisoned by the International Police right after Mars and Jupiter had left him behind in the stupid mountain. He had ratted out information on all of commanders, and the police had released bounties for the former members of Team Galactic in hopes of imprisoning them. Every trainer she had seen so far carried a newspaper with her face on the front, eager to get a reward of 100000 Pokédollars in exchange for turning her in.

Jupiter finished setting up her tent, and released her Pokémon so she could give them the necessary nourishment. The ungrateful animals ate the berries, and Jupiter resigned herself to laying low for the next month or two. Saturn had always grumbled that Charon's incompetence would be the death of them someday, and it turned out he was right. Karma had an odd and twisted sense of humor. The newspapers criticized the only captured member of Team Galactic, and it drove Jupiter insane that they thought all of the ex-commanders stood on the same level. It was as if the entire Sinnoh region had forgotten how close they had been to destroying their world, and that Charon was the only captured member _for a reason._

She sighed, and decided to go to sleep early so she could get an early head start over all of the other trainers in Eterna forest. Jupiter unzipped her sleeping bag and laid it out when she heard something outside her tent. She stepped outside into the night and was immediately face to face with a Staraptor. The bird simply dropped a note and then flew away into the darkness. She frowned as she bent down to pick up the fancy envelope that lay on the grass, squinting as she tried to read the loopy words. Jupiter went back into the tent to decipher the letter and to avoid the eyes of the trainers who had heard the giant bird.

She released her Bronzong to get some light, and saw that the letter only had her name on the cover. Snorting at the envelope for pointing out the obvious, Jupiter tore it open. She frowned when she read the one sentence written in cursive: _It's never too late to go after your dreams._

Jupiter realizes that it's from that Dawn, the one person who should be in charge of organizing her manhunt. Maybe she had some spunk after all, and Jupiter isn't going to throw away this chance. Not the one she never took when she was just a 10 year old.

The next morning, she flies to Snowpoint City and stows away on a cargo ship to the new region Unova, her new shining beacon of hope.

.

"And how old are you?" inquires the lady working at the trainer's license counter. She's flipping through the fake passport that Jupiter created for a fake persona she used temporarily during her early Team Galactic days.

"27," Jupiter growled, feeling irritated at the process. Why did the different leagues require their own trainer cards? It made everything so complicated, especially when you were a runaway being chased by the police. The only good thing about the whole bounty for being evil thing was that the news about the ex-commanders hadn't reached Unova yet.

"Your name?" the woman asked, snapping Jupiter out of her thoughts. "What's your reason for getting a Pokémon trainer's license from here in Unova?"

Jupiter considers her first question carefully and quickly. Darn it, what was the name on the passport again? She recalled the answer in a split second, hoping the worker wouldn't get too suspicious. "I'm Juno. Stelle. Juno Stelle. I'm applying for a license because I'm considering taking the Unova league challenge."

The lady raises an eyebrow, silently judging her ambitions at the age of 27. "Alright, your application has been cleared. I'm taking a picture of you in 3…2…1."

The camera flashes, and Jupiter—no, it's Juno now—mentally pats herself on the back for cutting off about 5 inches of her hair and snagging some new clothes. The lady handed over her new trainer's license, and suddenly, she feels a wave of nostalgia. It fades away just as quickly as it came, and Jupiter leaves wearing a new mask that she never knew she would have to use again. She's Juno now, and Unova won't know what hit them. Juno smirks, and saunters out of the Pokémon Center confidently.

Hasta la vista, Jupiter. I'll see you again someday.


End file.
